Blue screen of death!

[oppirs]

I got an old XP era 2002-3. That can't mount the boot. "unmountable_boot_volume" blue screen. I just want to back-up the files not revive this old machine(slow CPU).

Many posters seem to be from IT or know there stuff! So any free programs that would let me access the hard drive? Hard drive seems to work. If I can access, and usb's works I prefer that method to CD burning. But at this point I'll take anything.

I don't have Windows XP disk. I have 6 floppy's, that bring me to windows set-up to try a recovery....but that failed. I made floppy/cd-rom the first-2 devices in BIOS.

I have a HP pavilion 541c, no windows xp disk only floppy's from microsft online, version no service pack. Is this correct?

Any & all help appreciated!

 

[bepperb]

Can you just plug that hard drive into another machine and copy the files from it onto the newer machine?

Hard drives aren't difficult to move, there's one molex power connector and one 40 pin IDE ribbon cable. Very new machines might not have an IDE port but most still do.

 

[rshaw125]

I have done this two ways. 1. install as second hard drive in another machine. 2 install in an enclosure attach to another computer's USB.

 

[Jeffy_D]

Download puppy Linux www.puppyLinux.com install on USB , DVD, or external drive. Boot from the media you installed it on, and browse for your data. It is a "live" OS, So it wont install on the bad hard drive, just loads itself into memory. You will need CD/dvd's or a USB stick or external hard drive to backup data. (you can backup to the USB stick or externsl drive that you put puppy Linux on , space permitting)

The others posted good ideas as well, this will be handy in the future if you get a virus that wont quarantine.

 

[oppirs]

Dang!!! All good responses. Thanks,

(didn't X my mind). I can gut this old XP, and put HD in another, so I'll try that 1st.

 

[buickman50401]

Originally Posted By: oppirs
I got an old XP era 2002-3. That can't mount the boot. "unmountable_boot_volume" blue screen. I just want to back-up the files not revive this old machine(slow CPU).


This might be salvageable in a few easy steps. Firstly, have you been using it lately? There are a couple of viruses delivered through javascript exploits that can cause this (I've seen it on 3 machines in the last month).

Regardless, try this first.

Boot from your XP CD and choose the Repair option to get into recovery console. Type fixboot at the prompt. Then type fixmbr.

Reboot the machine and see if windows will start to load. It may then want to perform a checkdisk. If so let it do so. If windows loads but no checkdisk scan comes up, its better to be safe than sorry and go ahead and run a checkdisk.

Do do so, reboot from the XP CD, go into the recovery console again and type chkdsk /r

Once these actions are completed then boot into safemode with networking and download Rkill from http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/download/anti-virus/rkill

Run rkill and let it do its thing. Then download malwarebytes (if you don't already have it) and HitmanPro. Run the MWB scan first and follow any removal instructions regarding reboots. If it finds something and wants you to reboot, let it do so. Then after the reboot exit windows again and reboot into safe mode again and run HitmanPro.

 

[oppirs]

Just to finish this thread. I x-fered the HD to another computer. Automatic software repaired the drive & it working fine now. Took all of 5 min to mount up, thanks everyone!!